


Smother and Cover

by dinolaur



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Gen, domestic team
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-03
Updated: 2015-09-03
Packaged: 2018-04-18 20:23:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,416
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4719245
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dinolaur/pseuds/dinolaur
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Steve and Bucky's war stories are really interesting to listen to until they aren't, and the team is willing to go to drastic measures to make the torment stop.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Smother and Cover

Tony hasn't set anything on fire on purpose in a very long time, excluding some choice and very deliberate explosions, but lately he has been considering it. Because something has to change around here. Something has to stop them. Because Tony is going to lose his goddamned mind if he has to listen to Steve and Bucky tell the same old war stories one more time.

At first it was amazing. Steve and Sam, following Natasha's crumb trails, went on a months' long hunt for the missing Winter Soldier and finally brought home Bucky Barnes. It was hard. There was a trial, one that Bucky himself insisted on, and everyone still alive who had even a sliver of a connection to the man jumped up to help. They pulled off a ruling of not-guilty by the skin of their teeth, and half the country is still freaking out, and the government is freaking out, but James Barnes is a free man, and Steve is over the moon.

Actually getting to meet Bucky Barnes, one of the heroes of his childhood, a man that Tony's father had known personally, was even more of a highlight than meeting Cap. Tony's first encounter with Steve had been rough, to put it nicely. But they've gotten to a better place, which helps with meeting Bucky. And Bucky still has bad days, haunted days, but the man is determined to integrate himself fully into his new found freedom, and that eventually leads to lots of old stories.

Howard hadn't really gotten too into the dynamic between Captain America and his right hand Commando, so Tony isn't fully expecting just how much they delight in trying to embarrass the other to death. They are complete assholes, and it's amazing. He wants to Vine everything they say. He is pretty sure Clint is trying.

When they start telling old war stories, ones that didn't make it into the comics or did but the comics had it really, really wrong, they have a captive audience. Rhodey hangs around the Tower more often. He is as much of a Cap and Bucky fanboy as Tony ever was. Clint hangs onto every word with stars in his eyes, and Sam looks like he is trying really hard to not but can't stop himself. Thor doesn't quite share in the pop culture significance of it all, but he too enjoys the tales of battle. The twins are amazed, and Vision takes in everything with what passes for him as awe.

It's really, really cool. At first. It's obvious which stories are their favorites, because they tell them multiple times. But then they start telling them all the time. It's like the old war days are the only thing Steve and Bucky can hold a conversation about. It stops being cool and starts being like listening to your grandpa tell you for the ten thousandth time about how he only owned one pair of shoes as a child and had to wear them until they fell apart and he walked fifteen miles uphill both ways in the snow to get to school.

There is a part of Tony--a very, very small part that sounds just like Pepper--that feels almost bad for being annoyed with them. If there's two guys in this world who deserve a bit of damned happiness it's Steve Rogers and Bucky Barnes, and they do seem pretty happy to be telling these old stories. But God, please, just find a new one. There has to be a new one in there somewhere.

The energy of the room has done a complete one-eighty. Pietro looks so bored that he is about to vibrate a hole through the floor, and Wanda practically lives in a trace. Tony and Rhodey make painful bitchfaces at each other, and Clint just keeps his phone glued under his nose and plays Angry Birds or live tweets nonverbal complaints. Thor is too polite to just walk out of the room. The only one of them who looks like he's still paying any attention is Sam, because Sam is a better person than all of them combined.

The only ray of sunshine in any of this is Natasha standing behind their backs mimicking Steve and Bucky while making arm motions that remind them of a flight attendant.

So, yeah, Tony is really close to setting something on fire, because other than a hoard of Doombots attacking, he doesn't know what would work to shut them up.

When it does happen, it's a silently organic process, a team effort that Steve really ought to be proud of them for. It's dinner time, and Sam has offered to fry up his grandmother's fish recipe. The evening is fine until someone says something that sets Steve and Bucky off. It's the same old story about the same old base and the same old march through the same old woods in the same old snow listening to the same old Commando bickering.

The rest of them exchange silent looks of mourning for their spoiled evening. Tony can't take this anymore; he really can't. He locks eyes with Sam, and Sam sees it, sees just how close he is to snapping. And Sam probably has to listen to this crap even more than the rest of them, because he and Natasha share an apartment in Brooklyn with those two old jerks. Sam understands, and Sam is a hero, so he knows that today is the day that someone needs to throw themselves on the bomb.

He gives Tony a meaningful look. Then his eyes slowly slide to the grease heating up on the stove. Then he nods once. Yes, Sam truly is the best of them all. Slowly, Tony passes by the skillet and gently sets the lid over it. Then he steps away.

They all wait.

"Something kind of smells like burning," Steve eventually says, tearing himself away from the story, which Tony assumes causes him actual, physical pain.

"Sam, the skillet," Bucky says, pointing.

"Oh, oops," Sam says, and Tony applauds him, because he doesn't think he could sound that sincere if he tried. "Someone should take the lid off."

"No, wait," Steve starts, but Thor, fireproof Thor, has already moved in. He lifts the lid off the skillet, and a ball of fire shoots up.

"Oh my," Rhodey exclaims in a manner that is in no way convincing at all.

"Put it out," Bucky yells.

Clint stares at the fire for just two seconds with narrowed, calculating eyes. Then he says, "I got it," and tosses the water from his glass at the flames. It just shoots up more.

Bucky hollers, "What the fuck's the matter with you?"

"You can't put out a grease fire with water," Steve finishes. Their accents are probably the thickest any of them have ever heard. It's hilarious.

"We'll do it," the twins offer, and one hex-bolt and purposefully clumsy run-by later, the skillet has been knocked over, and half the kitchen is on fire. "How do you say, oops?"

It's finally enough smoke that the sprinklers come on, just as Pepper is walking in. In seconds they are all soaked, and Pepper starts screaming about do they have any idea how long it takes for her to dry and straighten and style her hair and do they have even the slightest inkling of how much her dress costs.

Of course, the sprinklers just make the fire worse, and Bucky scrambles to pull out the fire extinguisher, and Steve starts smothering the flames with his shield. No one else lifts a finger to help. Once the fire is out, the two grandpas turn furious gazes on the rest of the team. "What is the matter with all of you," Steve begins his lecture.

Everyone just stands there, soaking and basking in a job well done. Natasha rubs her eyes furiously, smearing all her mascara into raccoon eyes. Sam and Clint can't keep a straight face when she turns a severe Russian frown on them, exactly mirroring Bucky's stance at Steve's side. Thor stares a bit mournfully at the ruined fish. He thuds his fist over his heart and says, "A sorrowful but worthy sacrifice."

The entire thing ends up on YouTube with the caption "when you just can't handle Grandpa's stories anymore. #drasticmeasures #rememberkids #smotherandcover #ripgrammywilsonsfish." It's sort of hilarious how much pompous, nose-in-the-air indignation two poor kids from Brooklyn can muster up at the sight of it.

**Author's Note:**

> I wonder if I'm capable of writing a serious story about these assholes.


End file.
